Cosplay photographers are obviously very common sites at conventions. We can be seen posing cosplayers, lugging around bulky equipment and setting off flashes bright enough to blind. I know most do not know what any of the equipment is and why would you, your not a photographer. Just know that’s its very expensive and do not touch it LOL, just kidding. But, one of the most expensive items photographers own are their lenses. The body of the camera such as this Sony a7 are rather expensive but, they can pale in comparison to a very nice 85mm 1.2 prime lens.
Basically photography equipment can become very expensive and you can see why photographers guard their equipment like a mother guarding her newborn child. But, if you’re like most of us you do not have tons of money just lying around so you have to make do with what you have and what you can afford. With that being said, I want to take a look at what you can do with a basic kit lens. That’s right, I ditched my nifty fifty lens and put the golden 85mm aside to see what I could accomplish with the basic kit lens. I must say, I don’t think I did too bad, let’s check it out.
First up let me disclose that I shoot on a Nikon D7000 and when I say kit lens I’m talking about the basic 18-55mm lens. This camera is a bit dated but she’s faithful and has never let me down. I do wish she had a more reliable focusing system or even the eye-tracking system of the new cameras but hey, she still gets the job done. So back to this kit lens. It’s not the best or the worst lens ever made it’s just mediocre. Not too great or too bad at anything. To prevent boring you with lots of fancy photography mumbo jumbo, ill just say this lens doesn’t excel at blurring images or making them incredibly sharp. I mean it’s the kit lens so its not specialized in any particular aspect.
But, just because you do not see this lens on any Reddit forms or eBay’s most bought list doesn’t mean you should completely disregard it. If it’s all you have then that’s what you have to work with. A great photographer isn’t defined by his equipment and can turn nearly any situation into a positive one. Lots assume that the better the equipment you have, the better the photographer you are. The newer equipment does help and will save you time here and there, but knowing the fundamentals its really what it’s all about.
For awa, I only used this kit lens (18-55mm) for my indoor photos but must admit I paired it with my Godox 32 inch diffuser and Orlit Monolight. That’s simply because I have a certain style of images I go for that requires the use of external flash. You by no means should use this as a standard. Feel free to use whatever equipment you want to create your amazing images. As long as you have an idea in mind and know what you’re trying to accomplish then I’m sure you will work it out one way or another. Just remember struggling develops ingenuity and creativity.
So for these shots, I wanted to see how this lens which is only capable of stopping down to f-3.5 would handle the idea of brightening the subject and darkening the background. Im sure most of you have seen these images where the cosplayer is bright but the background is dark. Unfortunately, since this lens only drops to 3.5, I wasn’t able to create that amazing bokeh effect. In layman’s terms, this is a blurry background with the subject in focus. Never the less, I still wanted to see what this lens could do. (Side note I later blurred the images in photoshop)
Ill admit that the images were not as sharp as when I use my 50mm lens but they definitely weren’t terrible or blurry. The subjects are clearly in focus and the background is reasonably dark. Side note, none of these images are straight out of the camera but I will give a few side by side photos to compare the before and after. For these shots, It seemed that as long as I did not have a well-lit or strong white background, the lens was capable of producing the desired effect. Now I know a lot of other factors go into producing these types of images such as your shutter speed, ISO and off-camera flash setting. But once again, I don’t want to bore you with that so we are only talking about an F-3.5 setting and of course a high shutter speed.
Take this image of BOB from overwatch as an example. Its clearly in focus while tons of cosplayers in the background were darkened out. Ps: Thanks to @dreadfully_cracked for posing for this picture. Of course we used a bit of lightroom and photoshop magic to produce the final image but overall I think it looks great. Similarly, this super girl cosplayed by @once_upon_a_fool, looks amazing as the same darkened background and in-focus subject effect is achieved. Now would it have looked better with a more expensive lens, yea most likely. But this image should show you that amazing images can still be captured with some of the cheaper lenses and a flash of course.
Another amazing advantage of this lens is that it is not a prime lens. This means that you can adjust its focal length by zooming. With prime lenses, your feet are the zoom mechanism meaning you have to physically walk forward or backward to get the entire subject in view. Not only does this become tiring but for individuals just starting out or only taking pictures for fun, composition can be a real hassle. Why not avoid both the hefty price tag and unnecessary headache of having to worry about where your standing with more expensive lenses and simply opt for a basic kit lens. Of course if you pursue the photography route, it will only be a matter of time until you outgrow this lens but for now, just enjoy its simple pleasures.
The better you learn a basic lens and experiment with its capabilities and limitations, the better your photography skills will be when you do upgrade to one of those hefty account draining lenses. Once again, im not trying to deter anyone from grabbing one of those amazing portrait lenses because god knows I wish I had the funds to purchase all of them. Im just saying work with what you have until you can work with what you want. Similar to my last post which can be found HERE, simply focus on yourself and your skills. Do not worry about how your images compare to others. Simply do the best you can. Set a goal and go from there. Your skills will improve and your images along with it.
I hope you enjoyed a few of my images from AWA and I would like to say thanks so much to all the cosplayers that allowed me to take their pictures. I really appreciate it. To see more awesome cosplay news, feel free to click HERE! And as always, I invite you to leave a comment below and let me know how your photography and cosplay journeys are coming. I would love to hear it! That’s everything for today, stay on the lookout for a brand new INTERVIEW WITH A COSPLAYER episode next week. We have another great cosplayer in the studio for you! That’s everything for today, as always stay BOUNDLESS!!!
